I welcome this opportunity to respond to this debate today and I’d like to thank Joyce Watson for her opening address and for the leadership role she’s played and is playing, demonstrated by her commitment to ensuring that the role and influence of Commonwealth women parliamentarians is actually extended and expanded. To have a Welsh woman Assembly Member leading the way and leading this is so well recognised—recognised by Rhun ap Iorwerth, Rhianon Passmore and Suzy Davies today. So, that is the most important starting point.

Of course, this body that you’re so engaged with and have this leadership role in—and indeed, Rhun, in terms of your role, and vice-chair of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, Rhianon—it is instrumental in generating discussion at the highest levels about the many issues and barriers facing women across the Commonwealth, and events across the world. At your conference in February this year on influencing policy and legislation for the empowerment of women, I was delighted to see that Welsh women shared their expertise and experience—Adele Baumgardt on gender budgeting and Dr Alison Parken on employment policies and equal pay. So, you were enabling Welsh women to share their expertise with Commonwealth women parliamentarians. Also at that conference, Joyce shared information—she’s talked about it this afternoon—about our ground-breaking Violence Against Women, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence (Wales) Act 2015, and our appointment of a national adviser for violence against women.

One of the key roles of the Commonwealth women parliamentarians is to look at ways of increasing the number of women in political and public life. Across the UK and, indeed, here in Wales, women are still under-represented in our political structures and decision-making processes. An absence of women in decision making, a lack of focus on issues that matter to women and girls, and a shortage of avenues to make their voices heard often leads to disengagement with politics and a weak basis for effective policy and legislation. In Wales, we continue our commitment to increase the numbers of women in public life and to achieve gender balance in positions of power. We also, through our work to address the under-representation of women on public sector boards, and our diversity and democracy programme driving that, are challenging and changing the status quo.

We have pledged our commitment to the 50/50 by 2020 campaign, alongside employers and organisations in all sectors in Wales. We have a pledge as a Welsh Government to achieve a 50 per cent gender balance within the senior civil service by the year 2020, but we’re also making funding available to the Women Making a Difference balancing power project that’s educating and empowering women across Wales to have the skills, confidence and mindset to become leaders in their communities, and decision makers at all levels of public and political life. I do want to recognise at this point our female commissioners in Wales—Sophie Howe, the commissioner for future generations, Sarah Rochira for older people, Sally Holland for children, and Meri Huws for the Welsh language. These are significant public appointments. They do showcase the talent, the initiatives and the strides we’ve taken here in Wales to make sure that we have the best, that we encourage women to put themselves forward, and then they are appointed to those important positions. We are of course in Wales at the forefront of bringing gender equality into public and political life, with women playing key roles in many areas.

I think it’s very important to recognise that we have had a good story to tell in Wales. It’s common knowledge that we were the first devolved Assembly or Parliament to achieve a 50/50 gender balance. From 2000 to 2005 over half of our Cabinet Ministers, and from 2005 to 2007 over half of all our Assembly Members, were women. But we have to recognise that we’ve slipped back in terms of the number of female Assembly Members, now at 42 per cent. We’ve got to work together to find ways to encourage and support women to come forward as the Assembly Members of the future, and this debate enables us to make that point again.

Evidence does show clearly that gender-balanced boards, parliaments and leadership teams are better, not just for women, but for society as a whole. I think it is important just to recognise the ways in which this can be delivered. We have, for example Girls Make a Difference conferences, held over the last two years, which brought role models for a range of different careers, and year 12 and 13 girls together. Speakers were inspiring and encouraging young women to consider a wide range of non-traditional careers.

There is a danger that efforts to ensure equal representation and gender equality could be undermined in the post-Brexit era, and Joyce Watson has drawn attention to this, as did Rhun ap Iorwerth this afternoon. Women could become less visible. Their voices may not be heard in the debates that determine our lives and our futures. Suzy Davies makes an important point about modern foreign languages, and perhaps we can have a role to play in progressing those and ensuring that girls can be at the forefront. We want to ensure that, post Brexit, we don’t lose these opportunities, that women’s voices are heard, and that we keep and strengthen the networks that we have across Europe, and that we have to continue to face those barriers facing women and girls in terms of leadership opportunities. I think it is important that we look at the wider world, as you have, Joyce, today, looking, for example, at our continued commitment to the Wales for Africa programme. Since 2006, the Welsh Government has supported and encouraged thousands of people to get involved in mutually beneficial links between Wales and Africa, contributing to the campaign to make poverty history, and to deliver the UN millennium development goals. I met a Kenyan woman Minister, when I was health Minister in the Welsh Government, who had attended the same government school as myself in Eldoret in Kenya during my childhood in East Africa. We’d both become Ministers through very different circumstances. I was very proud and privileged to meet her.

Education continues to be the vital link in helping to achieve gender equality, and in the words of Dr James Emmanuel Kwegyir Aggrey, a great Ghanaian educationalist—let’s remember this—if you educate a man, you educate an individual, but if you educate a woman, you educate a family, a nation. In recent years, we’ve seen progress in Africa—Joyce has mentioned these—in terms of women breaking into positions of power, and since 2015, the UN sustainable development goals have been the focus of our efforts, including goal 5, to achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls. We strengthened our commitment last year with the passing of the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015. We want to build a prosperous Wales, but we take into account the global impact of our decisions and our actions.

Finally, I want to highlight the work of the Safe Foundation here in Wales. On 24 October, 10 young people, including four young women from Wales—those are young people who are in education, employment or training—will be travelling to Uganda to work on a social enterprise project. They’ll be participating in the life of the local community and its economy. They’ll be building a clay oven and delivering workshops on how to make bread. For the young people from Wales, I’ve no doubt—and you talked about the Commonwealth Youth Parliament and that exchange—that this will be a life-changing experience. It will help develop their confidence and leadership skills, and recognise that they have so much to offer. At the same time, the project will provide real and sustainable benefits in Africa in terms of income, nutrition and skills. And, of course, it will be, for those young people, an opportunity, as you say, Joyce Watson, to look out and to recognise what they can share across the world.

So, I’m very proud to respond to the debate today. Again, I thank Joyce for all her work in promoting Wales on the international stage, but we must continue to work together to make Wales a country where women are equally represented at all levels, and where there is fairness and equality for all, which we want to share across the world.